Warm August Nights
by Random Kaoru
Summary: Just a little trip for the residents of the Kamiya dojo. I little relaxation, and a little bonding in all directions.
1. Chapter 1

OK. Lets give this another shot, shall we? I'm still a little nervous about submitting my fully polishedwork, so I'm just taking baby steps. I can't believe how nervous this makes me.. I hope my friends see it and go nuts, though. I can only submit in this one crappy format so It makes me pretty mad….

**Disclaimer:** I don't own RK, yadda yadda yadda…**  
**

The sky was a deep shade of navy, only kept from black by the brightness of the moon. It wasn't a full moon, to be honest, but it was getting close. Crickets chirped restlessly under the stars, playing a soothing melody for anyone who was there to hear it, and a few thin clouds misted over the night sky.

The tanuki sighed in contentment, leaning against the open frame of her bedroom shouji. She had her legs bunched up in front of her in such a way that if she had needed a place to rest her chin, she'd only have to shift her position very slightly. Her eyes shown brightly with a peaceful awe inspired by the nightly song, and she soon found herself humming a soft harmony of her own. Though it was rather late in the evening and she had already been in bed for some time, the tanuki found herself teeming with a sort of quiet restlessness, and though it was early August, the nights were still quite warm and comfortable. In that light, Kaoru had succumb to her sleeplessness and opened the door to let in the night air.

"Tomorrow should be…..quite the day…." She mused softly to herself, standing and sliding the door closed again, shutting away the crisp night air  
--------------------------------------------------------------------------

Well? What do you think? I know it's not very long even for just one chapter but it's just a sample of my writing for now. Read, review, and all that goodness! Tell me if you like it.


	2. Chapter 2

**Disclaimer: you all know the drill.**

The shouji slid open, letting it a bright blaze of morning sun right into the face of one sleeping Yahiko. He turned over on his futon, planting his face in the pillow.

"Ugh… 5 more minutes…" he mumbled out by reflex, attempting to regain his precious slumber. In response, the blankets were torn away from his body as well as the very futon from underneath him.  
"H-hey!" the boy sat up, looking into the face of his rather amused sensei.  
"What in the hell did you do THAT for, busu?" the name earned him a whack on the head.  
"You're so lazy, Yahiko! Do you even know what time it is?" The tanuki chaimed in before he had a chance to respond. He simply looked at her as if he were trying to burn holes through her head. Kaoru sighed with exasperation. She took that as a 'no'.  
"Listen, It's almost seven and you aren't even dresses yet! Kenshin's already done making breakfast Sano's invited himself over to eat before we set off, so you're not gonna eat unless you get up NOW, ok?"

Her words seemed to snap him back to reality, and he immediately jumped up, Pushing the girl out of his room in a frantic rush, saying something about getting dressed.

The door slid behind her. Kaoru just sighed again, walking back towards the kitchen. They were running late already…  
---------------------  
"Ano…Sano…" the rurouni began, looking down at the fighters plate in dismay, "You'll have leave some for the rest of us, de gozaru yo…"  
Sanosuke paused for a moment from stuffing his face, taking one huge gulp to finish down his current mouthful of breakfast. He looked up at the rurouni with a skeptical determination and pointed a finger at him.   
"Hey, this breakfast is the LEAST you can do for me. I mean, jus' taking off, the three of you an' leaving me with nothing to do! I mean, I could understand not inviting; me if it were just you and Jou-chan, but you're taking the pipsqueak too!"

"I heard that, rooster head!" Yahiko appeared in the doorway, just in time to throw himself at the source of the comment, gnawing at Sano's head… honestly, none of them were ever going to figure out exactly why he did that…

"Yahiko, just sit down and eat your breakfast." Kaoru billowed from outside the kitchen, joining the rest of them at the table.

"Yeah, or I else I can eat it for ya!" the fighter teased, his own plate already cleared.

"You will not!" Yahiko dived at his plate before anyone could get in another word.  


"Yeesh, I was jus' kiddin, ya know." Sano arched an eyebrow at the boy.

"Demo…Sano, you HAVE eaten Yahiko's share in the past, de gozaru yo." The rurouni chimed in faintly. Indeed, there had been several occasions in which Sano had had emptied his own portions and simply moved onto the next person's plate.

"Well what am I supposed to do, just watch well you all eat and I have nothing'?" he protested, clearly not having eaten his fill.

"We didn't tell you to start without out us Sanosuke, so that's your problem!" The tanuki asserted forcefully, starting on her own plate  
--  
After breakfast had been completed ( not hardly 3 minutes later) Sano had left the trio, though not before asserting more complaints on his part.

"Come on, Yahiko, we should have left by now, what are you doing?" Kaoru and Kenshin had already been standing at the gate for almost five minutes.

"Ano…He's packing, I believe." the rurouni commented with a faint smile. It wasn't as if anyone had many things to bring, but on occasion it could take Yahiko a while to tie up his belongings.

" I told him to pack last night…" the tanuki mused with another sigh. " I didn't want to have to wait to set out…" As if he'd heard the complaint, Yahiko came running out to the gate, his belongings tied in a cloth on the end of his shinai.  
-------------------------------------------

A/N: I was going to sent them on a trip…and then I realized… I have no idea what the specific towns and cities were like back then …oh boy…so, sorry once again for the mini-chapter!


	3. Chapter 3

AN: Did you think I planned on never coming back?… actually you would have been right, but I wanted to find a good fanfic ( what better place to look). Now, you have to understand that this has no particular setting in the series, It's just a story floating in the realm of endless Kenshin…ENDLESS KENSHIN! GLORIOUS!… now read it :D

oh! By thw way, I have Kenshin say "I" sometimes instead of Sessha or This one, just because it flows better.

-------

" Ok! I'm done now! You can stop standing around already."

Kenshin smiled lightly at the boys comment.

" Who's standing around? We were waiting for you!"

"Right! And I'm here now, so we can go!" Yahiko responded to his sensei's comment and pushed ahead through the gate to join them on the other side.

Only just a few days ago had either Kenshin or Yahiko even heard about the trip. But, in fact, Kaoru had been planning it for a few months. She'd decided that the residents of the Kamiya dojo needed to get out for a while, So she started saving up months ago, taking just a little money out of the weekly budget and putting straight into her own secret 'travel fund'. If they were going to go on a trip, they'd need money.  
They were both quite surprised when Kaoru had announced that they were taking a vacation. Sano wasn't invited to come for two main reasons.; The first being that there was no way she could have saved up enough money for all _four_ of them to go. The second reason was simply due to the fact that Sanosuke already had plans with a few of his gambling buddies for the upcoming week, and he couldn't have just broken them off even if he had the funding to go.  
------

" Hey, Kaoru, can we take a break already? We've been walking for three straight hours at _least_!" Yahiko let out a faintly exhausted sigh and dropped his pack at the base of the nearest tree.

"Aa, actually This one was getting a bit tired as well, de gozaru." the rurouni chimed in.

"Hm… well, our first stop _is_ still a few miles away." Kaoru smiled and set her things bag down next to Yahiko's. " Are you really that tired already? "

"Actually that hill was rather steep, de gozaru.." the rurouni mumbled in a quieter tone.

" Yeah! No kidding! You didn't tell us we'd be mountain climbing!" the boy added in resent. He picked up his pack again (by now he was simply keeping the shinai strapped on and holding his bundle in either one or both hands) and looked questioningly at the girl. " I'm getting hungry…can we eat?"

" You're gonna have to choose between hungry and tired," The tanuki stated rather flatly, " Because the only way we'll make it into town in time for lunch is if we keep going."

Deciding they were all a lot more tired than hungry, they all had a good rest before setting out again, and by noon, they'd made it into town.

--------------

"Alright! Lets here it for food!" Yahiko's eyes lit up at the sight of the restaurant.  
It was packed inside, and they actually had to wait a few minutes for some other people to leave before there was any space for them to eat.

"Bonjour! Thank you for choosing our restaurant!" a fairly tall and rather attractive looking woman greeted them once they'd been seated. She had a very unique accent, and her hair was short and curved. It was obvious that she wasn't Japanese ( at least not entirely)

"a-ano…" Kaoru looked a bit intimidated as she tried to find a response. _Did we… is this… a foreign restaurant?_ If, indeed, they were in a foreign restaurant, she had no idea what to order.

The woman noticed the perplexed look on the tanuki's face and smiled sympathetically. "Would you like me to order for you?"

"Ah, hai! Arigatou." Kaoru eased up a bit and smiled at their hostess. At least, now, she didn't have to ask. The woman laughed lightly at the look on the tanuki's face. " We get this all the time with travelers, don't worry about it." with a wink, the woman set off towards the kitchen.

Kenshin, Kaoru and Yahiko, just looked at each other, equally embarrassed and excited.

"Hey, do you think this is some kind of western place?" Yahiko mused to no one in particular.

" That might explain the crowding, I suppose." The rurouni added with a smile. " In any case, it couldn't hurt to try something new."

A while later, the waitress returned to the table with three plates of spaghetti with marinara sauce.

"Whoa! What _is _this stuff?" the boy was overjoyed.

_later than evening! _

"Wow! I'd never had noodles like that before!" Kaoru smiled , continuing to walk down the dirt path.

"Mm, but did we really have to come back for dinner too?" The red-head smiled with a look of faint amusement in his eyes.

"Yahiko was hungry." she responded quickly. Yahiko nudged her with his elbow from the opposite side.

"Come on, admit it, you wanted to go back too! That food was awesome!"

" Sessha liked the bread with the garlic, de gozaru yo."

"Aha! So you liked it too!" the tanuki smiled at him with a sense of victory.

" Heh, busted, Kenshin!"

"Oro…"  
----

"So, we're really camping out?" Yahiko looked back from seat by the river.

"That's why I bought the tents, yes.." Kaoru gave him an odd look, making it perfectly clear that she thought it was a dumb question.

"Demo, Kaoru-dono, couldn't we just have bought the cloth and set it up instead?" Kenshin watched the tanuki struggling to connect the metal poles.

"No way!" she kept fiddling. " These have a bottom! The futons won't even get dirty!" The last pole clicked together. " There! That wasn't so bad!"

" That was just yours…What about mine and Kenshin's?"

"…You can put your own up."  
----

The fish sizzled on the make-shift grill as the crickets started to chirp. The sun was getting lower it the sky. In a few hours it would be dark.  
Yahiko was off playing with a bunch of kids from the area. It had been a while since he'd had any playmates his age, and the other kids seemed to be just as excited to play with someone new.

"Ano…Kenshin?"

The rurouni looked up from the grill " Gomen, Kaoru-dono, this fish isn't ready just yet"

"It's not that…um…there's…" he noticed her eyes starting to tear a bit.

"Nani?" he asked, a hint of concern in his voice

"There's… a bird…and…I-I think it's hurt-" she paused with a little sniffle "- pretty bad.."

"Here." the tanuki indicated to a small, chirping, feathery lump near the base of a bush. "I-I almost stepped on him, but it started screaming…he can't fly…when he tries he just flaps and falls over…"  
It was a medium-sized bird, with blue and red feathers. Kaoru had never seen a bird like that, so the thought had crossed her mind that it might be someone's runaway pet.

"Ano… it's wing may be broken de gozaru…" he trailed off, wondering, faintly, why it had concerned the girl so much.  
Before Kenshin could put in a word of protest, Kaoru had reached over and picked up the injured bird. To his surprise, it didn't protest much.

" I think it has a home…" she said faintly, stroking it's head with the back of her finger. "He's used to being pet…"

The rurouni sighed in defeat. She'd obviously already made up her mind to help it, and he didn't see the point in trying to talk her out of it. "I suppose we could make him a splint, if he'd allow it, de gozaru ka."

And so, they'd fitted the bird with a make-shift splint, despite some protests from the patient, and brought him back to their campsite.

When the sun was just nearly, setting, Yahiko returned, accompanied by some of his friends who'd come to walk him back.  
As they were about to leave, one of the girls noticed the small bundle in the tanuki's arms and shouted out in excitement.

"SORA!" the bird chirped excitedly in response to her voice. The girl ran over and kneeled down next to Kaoru, with tears in her eyes. "Sora, you stupid bird, I thought I'd never see you again! And you got hurt! My poor baby-"

"He's yours?" the tanuki asked, a little surprised. The girl looked up at her, wiping her eyes frantically.

"Y-yes! He got out of his cage! Almost 3 weeks ago!" she scooped him up into her hands. "Thank you so much….I'll take him home now."

" …don't let him out again.." the tanuki smiled ruefully at the little bird.

" I won't…" She turned to Yahiko " Bye, Yahiko-chan!" and with that, they left.  
Yahiko would have been extremely embarrassed if it weren't for that fact that's he'd noticed she'd call _all_ her friends 'chan'

----------

uhh.. I didn't know how to end this chapter! The whole thing is very spur-of-the-moment… as if you didn't notice. I know I said thsi one wouldn't be mini...um.. i lied...maybe next time. Anyway, I plan to have some KK waffiness in the next chapter 3 hurrah!


End file.
